, Columnist
This Era of Institutional Flip-Flops May Be Different
Parties often abandon their principles in presidential transitions. But it could prove particularly troublesome this time.
Meeting of opposites.
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Welcome to the period of “institutional flip-flops” -- sudden abandonment of seemingly firm institutional principles, prompted by just one thing: the political party of the current president.
A few months ago, many Republicans were enamored with an eight-member Supreme Court, an idea that Democrats treated as a constitutional atrocity. Now that a Republican is about to become president, prominent Democrats have no problem with a short-handed court, while Republicans treat the very thought as an outrage.